The things that can be found when chasing down info. I'm a huge athletics fan, and as such went looking for Hicham El Guerrouj's 1500m. world record time. What a runner. He set the flat 3.26.00 17 years ago. Amazing. Anyway I checked through the list of previous record holders and came across a New Zealander named Jack Lovelock who in setting the world record of 3.47.8, took the 1936 Olympic Gold medal in Berlin. So I checked him out and found him to be one hell of a human being. Born in NZ in 1910 to English parents, he excelled in all things academic, social and sporting, to the extent that he became dux of his school in his final year. He was head prefect, played Rugby Union and was the school's champion boxer. He was then off to Uni in Otago where he won acclaim in his medical studies. This brought him a Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford while in his early 20s. He was at this time, the holder of the mile Empire record. He would compete in the 1932 1500m Olympic Final in Los Angeles and finish seventh. It was at this point that he knew that if he was to go to the next level, he had to devise a new strategy on the track. Those very same neurons that earned him a Rhodes Scholarship, were turned to an assault on the 1936 games. In what is regarded as one of the finest races of it's time, the 1500m brought together the cream of a golden era of middle distance racing. Lovelock, like just about all runners in the lead up to the Final, had been a sit and kick runner. He, like the rest, would hold off until they flattened out for the run to the line, then let loose. But the Kiwi didn't think that this tactic would be good enough against a gent from the United States called Glenn Cunningham, a man who in the not distant future would be thought of as the greatest 1500m runner ever produced by that country. Of course others would go on to surpass him, but Cunningham at the time was much admired. It was in this 1936 Men's 1500m Final that Jack Lovelock would introduce a manoeuvre that would stand the test of time. Nearly 70 years down the track, the very same move is used to sort the men from the boys. And what did he do? It's so simple. All he did was to extend the run for home. Instead of opening up in the last 100m, he extended it to 300m. It was thought to do anything other than to sprint for the finish in the straight, was utter folly. Why spend gas so far from home and stagger the last 50m? For Lovelock, the problem was easily overcome. Put in more yards on the training track. All he needed was a better work ethic. He made sure that his superior fitness would not leave him short when reserves were most needed. He exploded around the two leaders as they entered they back straight, and set sail for home. He broke three metres clear of Cunningham, who after leading early, decided to came out after him. And as try as he might, the pride of the United States had no answer to the might of the the little bloke from the Shaky Isles who was off and gone. Jack Lovelock stormed to a crushing victory, taking the World Record in the process. After serving as a Major in the Royal Army Medical Corp during World War Two, Jack Lovelock and his family moved to New York where he took up residency at the Manhattan Hospital. Three years later, at age just 39, he would be dead. To this day, his death remains a bit of a mystery. He was a gent who had suffered three head wounds while in the service of his country during the war, and as a result, suffered constant headaches and from time to time, blurred vision. On 28 December 1949, he phoned his wife, saying he was coming home early as he wasn't feeling all that flash. While waiting at the subway in Brooklyn, he appears to have suffered a bout of dizziness and fell onto the railway track, where he met his death under an oncoming train. Some have suggested that he may have had enough and taken his life, but the the fact that he'd already called home informing his wife that he was feeling unwell, indicated that he probably died by accident, a verdict passed by the authorities at the time. In the following clip, the first five seconds shows some well known faces.
Great article and video clip, Cyc, many thanks. Jack Lovelock was a truly great man and a superb athlete. He, and Jesse Owens, did it right under the noses of the ghastly Hitler, Goebbels and Gang, too. Oh, by the way, the commentator was Harold Abrahams (love that 'Come on Jack!'), a champion sprinter himself who won the 100m Olympic title in Paris in1924 (as described in the 1981 film "Chariots Of Fire").
What made his record breaking performance even more remarkable was the fact that he had an arthritic knee - he had injected himself with a bacteria vaccine 109 times in the two years before the 1936 Olympics, trying to overcome these problems.
Nice article Cyc, I would implore you to read the book "Unbroken" which tells the story of Louis Zamperini. I won't add any more than that, but it is a story everyone should read - quite remarkable.
